Time to think

When was the last time you stopped to think? Perhaps it was in the bath? Or maybe in the early hours when you couldn’t sleep? I often bemoan the fact that I don’t have time to reflect on where I am in life. To think about what I have achieved and to plan what goals to aim for. I get frustrated that I am so busy that I can’t just stop and think.

When I do have time to relax, I fill it with friends and family. With weekend papers and wine. With dog walks and pub lunches, so I still don’t have time to think. When I go on my summer holiday, I devour books and sleep in the sun. I walk to cafés, drink coffee and explore new places and I still don’t have time to think.

Here’s a thought, perhaps time to think is overrated. When I schedule my bath (a week in advance due to having 4 daughters), I imagine that I will wallow in its comforting warmth and indulge myself in reflections on life and what the universe holds for me. Yet the reality is that I lie there and think about all the things that I should have done that day. I try to write them in my phone, which then gets wet and I worry that I will drop it in the bath. Why is it that as soon as my desperate body slides into those delicious bubbles, I feel the overwhelming urge to write a list? Not the inspirational list I had hoped my thoughts would take me to whilst lying in my bath. No. A list of must do’s and forgot to do’s and shit there was something else, but I can’t quite remember what it is to do’s.

Then there’s the tossing and turning at 3am, when I’m wide awake for no apparent reason. Unexpected thinking time that I can immerse myself in without fear of interruption. I can turn this negative awake time around and imagine what I want for my future and what I have achieved in my past. But these useful thoughts seem to escape me and in their place I am gripped by anxiety. Anxious thoughts that I didn’t give a toss about yesterday and by the morning I don’t give a toss again.

In the past when I worried about something I would dwell on it, turn it over and over in my mind. I allowed myself too much time to think: what could happen? What might happen? The more thinking fertilizer I fed the worry, the more the worry grew. Now I try and stubbornly refuse to give my worries airspace. Rather than stopping to think, I get my head down and hurry right on by.

When was the last time you got to stop and think? But more importantly, when was the last time you were able to use your precious thinking time well? Perhaps we shouldn’t seek time to reflect, but simply to enjoy the moment.